


Not alone

by Gabriel4Sam



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith
Genre: Fix-It of Sorts, M/M, Mace Windu Lives, Post-Order 66, Post-Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, Somebody Lives/Not Everyone Dies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-22
Updated: 2018-09-22
Packaged: 2019-07-15 13:06:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16063760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gabriel4Sam/pseuds/Gabriel4Sam
Summary: Obi-Wan was nursing a dark ale in a cantina when he recognized Mace on the holonews, months after the supposed death of his fellow Jedi in the Purge.





	Not alone

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Perspicacia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Perspicacia/gifts).



Obi-Wan was in Anchoread when it happened. He had come to buy some medicines for his eopie, which was waiting for a little eopie that he hoped one day give to Luke. After his purchases, he had decided to offer himself one ale, just one, in a cantina. He didn’t dare keep alcohol in his little home, he was too aware of the risks of a PTSD veteran with too much guilt, no support of friends and family, and too much time on his hands against the possibilities of sweet oblivion.

So, here he was, nursing that one dark ale and listening to the noises of the cantina around him. The band was on pause and cheating some idiots on cards. The barman was trying to convince an old drunk to go home to his children…

And in a corner, a holopost was transmitting the Empire official channel, where they were displaying a row of Wookies, arranged in a row and awaiting executions, as an official was belching a speech about the glorious times to come, now that the Wookie’s illegal rebellion was down. His heart in his throat, Obi-Wan abandoned his ale and stood up to go home. He didn’t need to see this, to add images to his guilt about the rest of the galaxy.

He almost missed the tell-tale hiss of the lightsaber and turned just in time to see on the screen a silhouette, dressed like a spacer like any other, but with a mask, jumping on the rescue, melting the wookies chains and sending blasters shoots back to the trooper with a lightsaber. The mask was probably for the software of facial recognition the Empire was installing more and more everywhere they could, because the purple lightsaber was a banner, a cry of rally, which everybody with half a brain cell would recognize.

Obi-Wan sat down heavily again.

They were not alone. Yoda and he were not alone.

Mace Windu was alive and quite busy making a nuisance of himself to the Empire. The image was cut down as a technician smarter than the other probably realized letting all the Empire see a supposed dead Jedi rescue rebels would be damageable for the moral, or more importantly for his health. Obi-Wan didn’t need to see the rest to know how it would turn. Sunk into Vapaad, Mace was unstoppable, only treachery could touch him when he opened himself to his anger and channelled it into righteousness.

Obi-Wan exited the cantina quickly and let the desert swallowed him. He went straight to the Lars’ homestead, when Owen wasn’t particularly happy to see him, but let him enter when he saw how pale and almost trembling the Jedi was. Obi-Wan told them everything.

“You need to go,” the farmer said, surprising the Jedi. He would have thought Beru would be the one to understand first.

“Family is important,” Owen added, “For some months, Beru’s brothers have wanted to visit us to meet Luke and I always found some pretext, because I find them unbearable. But I will invite them now. Luke will be under the watch of more adults.”

“Remember his true parentage must…”

“Ben, I know. I’m pretty sure a six months old will manage to survive with only a half-dozen caretakers for the length of your travel. Even here. Moisture farmers have raised children for centuries.”

And that’s how Obi-Wan left Tatooine, guilt and hope raging in his heart despite meditation, and attacked the problem of finding Mace Windu, a wanted man who had succeed in escaping the Empire’s clutches for six months, despite being probably one of the higher target in Sidious’s book. The guilt followed him all the way.

Guilt because he had left Luke without Jedi protection.

Guilt because he felt like he had deserted his post.

Guilt because there was something he hadn’t said to Owen and Beru. Mace wasn’t only a surviving Jedi, an ally and a friend.

Mace was the man of early mornings when they took the time of breakfast together and the first kisses tasted of tea.

Mace was the man of late nights, when they tumbled to bed exhausted by their work, with the only strength to throw away their boots and belts, but it was still fine, because the other was there.

Mace was the man of shared lunches, each on his datapad because there was so much work, but their knees touching under the table and comfort blooming from that small intimacy.

Mace was the man who had convinced him he was worthy of love and filled an empty place in his heart he hadn’t even realized existed.

Mace was the man who had been his friend first, his support in difficult times, his sparring partner in late nights of insomnia, his confident, and his lover too.

Mace.

Mace was alive.

Obi-Wan didn’t know what they would do if he found him. _When_ he found him. Would they go back to Tatooine? In that case, what of the people Mace could still help in the galaxy? Would they stay together, trying to save all those they could, until the day they would be just a tad too slow and blaster fire would take them?

Those questions were for later, Obi-Wan tried so hard to stay in the moment, in his search.

He needed three months only, and a little help from Queen Organa, to succeed where the newly founded Inquisitors were failing. He knew his lover like even Yoda didn’t, understood the way his mind worked, the same way Mace understood him. In a mangrove in an unnamed moon of the Outer Rim, Obi-Wan started running as fast as he could on the spongy soil with a cry of joy and thrown himself in the arms of Mace, who didn’t even seemed surprised and closed them around him, taking his lips in the same movement.

There were so many questions to resolve in the future, so many that they would start to buzz quickly in their minds, but for now, they left them blissfully alone, just the two of them, the stumbling to Mace’s hidden place, a small cottage, the noises of Obi-Wan when he discovered the two prosthesis hands of his lover, memories of Darth Vader’s choices, the kisses he put on them, the hundred words of comfort and love.

There were so many questions but for now, the other was the only answer they needed.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on tumblr too, under the same username, come and say hi!


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